MightBeAlpharius

A lot of people conflate "knowledge" and "intelligence." Not the guy you replied to, they seem like a troll; but still, a lot of people.

Our ancestors had intelligence in spades. They figured out an insane amount of stuff just to survive; and it's not too far back in the grand scheme of things that they had to remember it all because they had no way to record it. The first caveman to make a handaxe had absolutely no idea what he was doing, but they figured it out. Wheels, bows, fire, the entire concept of agriculture... They figured out how all of that worked from scratch, with no reference material.

Modern humanity builds on that with knowledge. We've figured out how to record everything our ancestors discovered, and all of our new discoveries as well. We've put men on the moon, figured out how to make electricity from things like waterfalls and glowing rocks, and almost everyone has a tiny computer in their pocket.

None of that means that we're more intelligent now, though. All of that knowledge is iterative, so we've just been applying that same intelligence at a continually higher level throughout history.

I'm pretty sure it's implied that Doom & Doom II weren't fully removed from the continuity, though.

IIRC, the original games end with the Doom Marine stuck in hell... Which is also where they found the Doom Slayer. Additionally, despite his background with the Argenta, the Slayer is confirmed to be human in an audio recording; and his Praetor armor is similar enough to the UAC Elite Guard armor that he can upgrade his armor with tokens taken from dead guards.

So... In short, the Slayer might still be the Marine, but with a ton of interstitial backstory that kind of renders his actual origin irrelevant.

maybe a little less sweet

I see what you did there

I grew up rural too, but in a less conservative area, and... Honestly, it made for some hilarious moments in sex ed.

I think the crowning moment was in high school health class - at the start of the sex ed unit, they split us up by gender, and had both groups try to draw both reproductive systems as a baseline for what we knew. Both groups did pretry well with the male stuff, but there was a stark (and unexpected) difference in the diagrams of the female reproductive system:

The girls group did an excellent job of drawing and labeling a vagina, but almost none of the internal bits.

The boys group, though... One dude had noticed something about the general shape of female reproductive system in an earlier class, and came up with a his own mnemonic for it: turns out, you can sketch oit the general layout of the ovaries, fallopian tubes, uterus, and birth canal pretty neatly over the dodge ram logo.

I worked at CVS when they bought Aetna... The insurance offered to employees got worse.

I think the issue started a little over a decade ago, when the Boy Scouts got in some hot water for discriminating against gay kids and they actually tried to be better.

Up until right now, I always thought Coachella was just the name of the festival, not a place - sort of like Burning Man.

I've never been more confused by a headline in my life.

They also usually use some weasel words like "up to." That way, if it doesn't last the full 72 hours (which it won't), they can claim that they stated "72 hours MAXIMUM" rather than just "72 hours." It's basically shifts the statement from "lasts three days" to "definitely won't last four days."

I let out a long sigh.

This has to be a joke. Something they tell the new guys to jerk them around. "Collect taxes from cryptids" my ass, this is straight up workplace hazing. They even sent Jim along to keep me company - he's probably going to film this for the office christmas party or something. Well... I guess I may as well play along. "So, how am I supposed to contact Bigfoot? Just shout into the woods?"

"Yes, actually. This is where we've found him the past few years, so he's probably still living here. And he prefers 'Mister Squatch.'" Jim's advice doesn't make this feel any less like a prank.

"Mister Squatch? You have to be kidding me... EXCUSE ME? MISTER SQUATCH?" I bellow, "WE'VE BEEN SENT TO CONTACT YOU ON BEHALF OF THE IRS!" I can't believe I'm out here making a complete fool of myself.

And then it happens.

A rustle in the bushes, followed by snapping twigs and shaking branches moving fast through the underbrush. Jim bends down and opens his briefcase - why? Why did he even bring a briefcase to the middle of the woods? Suddenly, the movement in the bushes stops as it reaches a clearing, and I see something massive race towards the trees on the far side. Suddenly, it stumbles, tripping and tumbling as it falls, wrapped in a net.

A net? Where did a net come from in the middle of the woods? And then I see Jim's empty briefcase, and the empty net gun in his hand. Laying in the middle of the clearing is the Bigfoot, and now I have to treat this like it's normal and actually collect his taxes. Before I can even react, though, Jim is starting to untangle Bigfoot. "Look, Mister Squatch, I keep telling you, if you just pay your taxes, we won't have to keep hunting you down like this. You know the drill, pay up or we'll start telling the tabloids about where you live. You remember how annoying that was last time, right?"

"Yeah..." Bigfoot talks!? I'm not even sure if I'm at work right now, or if the CIA guys in the next office over slipped LSD into our coffee again. "I still keep it in the cave by the creek, just take what I owe you and leave me alone."

"Glad we could settle this easily." Jim cuts him free, and turns to me. "Let's go get the money. We've got a lot of ground to cover... Our next stop is in West Virginia. Say, how do you feel about bridges?"

I feel like I need a new job.

I've worked in retail, and... That's not an actual RFID alarm sticker, and it's not just there for the potential theives.

Some manufacturers will actually put an RFID tag on the inside of the box. These tags work exactly like the RFID stickers, and they're deactivated the same way (usually a magnet underneath the store's counter).

This sticker is actually a "chip away" anti-theft sticker. They frequently go on the same products that get RFID stickers, but all they do is tear apart instead of peeling off. They're mostly an internal tool for LP to try to link thefts and fraudulent returns (that number is the store number that it came from). This one just happens to conveniently have "ALARM" printed on it as a secondary feature, letting thieves know that the item will set off the alarm without showing where the RFID tag is.

Edit: I should probably add that they also put them on high-theft non-alarmed items, but they probably didn't get separate sets of stickers.

Flat Earth? Firmament?

Sir, I assure you that the Earth is round... For the Space Lasers move separately from the stars fixed upon the Firmament! Clearly they are hung within the Crystal Spheres which revolve around us! And how could those divine Spheres revolve, were the Earth not round?

It also doesn't really look like a pool on Google maps - it's got sandy beaches, rather than walls with stepped/ramped entrances.

Even when that one opens, I'd argue that OP posted the largest pool, and this is more of an artificial pond.